Expansionism

About: Expansionism is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 979 publications have been published within this topic receiving 11169 citations.

The Diplomacy of Isolation: South African Foreign Policy Making

Abstract: its actual substantial assistance to corrupt and repressive regimes. In the same vein, the lack of special focus on U.S. economic interests as a motivating factor of foreign policy in Africa, particularly as regards South Africa, tends to diminish the significance of this volume. NA TO, the Warsaw Pact and Africa not only offers a 'study of NATO's involvement in Africa from the date of its inception', but also attempts to 'lay to rest some of the more doubtful claims of NATO collusion with South Africa', as well as to 'highlight what many African states have identified as a quite different challenge from the Warsaw pact' (p. xi). Christopher Coker first of all identifies the basic events and processes that have shaped western strategic thinking and planning in Africa since I 949, and traces N.A.T.O.'s concerns to the perception in the West that Soviet expansionism must be opposed. He discusses the differences in approach and policy among the western powers, as well as the problems engendered by decolonisation in Africa which have rendered their strategic planning and activities ever more elusive and uncertain. In addition, Coker examines the Warsaw Pact involvement in Africa since 1959, and focuses on attempts to gain and maintain a foothold in Southern Africa. He discusses the economic importance of Africa to Eastern Europe, as well as the problems and uncertainties faced in trying to maintain stable client-states which could facilitate long-term trade arrangements for the export of raw materials to the member-states of the Warsaw Pact. Finally, the author examines the activities of the Western Alliance and the Soviet challenge to its influence in postindependence Africa. This book is a welcome addition to the growing body of literature on western and eastern foreign policies in Africa, and should prove useful to all those who are interested in a critical understanding of the roots and current status of East-West competition in the continent. Particularly important is Coker's critical analysis of the mechanisms employed by the Soviet Union and its allies to maintain an uninterrupted flow of raw materials from client-states in Africa. One major shortcoming, however, appears to be the author's inability to use the wealth of data and analysis to examine the long-term implications of such competing foreign policies. Those who read this serious study may wonder if Africa will forever remain a victim in the East-West struggle for strategic dominance and economic exploitation.

Cultural imperialism: A critical theory of interorganizational change

Abstract: Current theories of organization tend to discuss the management of change across networks in a grammar of instrumental reason, thereby offering legitimacy to the imperialism that emerges when groups come together in a shared‐change experience. However, by adopting principles of critical theory, the social research project initiated by a group of scholars known as the “Frankfurt School”, we may challenge this degradation of knowledge and its companion, human domination. A critical theory of interorganizational change reveals three forms of organizational imperialism: cultural domination, cultural imposition, and cultural fragmentation. From this perspective, we may understand the deleterious human, social and cultural consequences of organizational expansionism, and thereby initiate a dialogue for cultural emancipation, a more meaningful, culturally sensitive approach to change.

Migration Management and Humanitarian Protection: The UNHCR's ‘Resettlement Expansionism’ and Its Impact on Policy-making in the EU and Australia

Abstract: Since the late 1990s, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has been a key actor in the resurgence of refugee resettlement in global debates on asylum and refugee policies. This article investigates the dynamics of the international organisation's ‘resettlement expansionism’ within the UNHCR as well as its impact on policy-making. Firstly, it analyses how the UNHCR has increased its expertise production and dissemination as well as its operational focus on resettlement. Secondly, it assesses the policy-making impact of the UNCR's ‘resettlement expansionism’ in two distinct contexts: the elaboration of the EU's new joint resettlement scheme and the recent increase of resettlement places by 40% in Australia, a traditional country of resettlement. Lastly, it discusses potential implications of this research in regards to the evolution of the global refugee regime and, more conceptually, to the study of knowledge production and expertise in migration and refugee policy.

The Formative Years of the American Society of International Law

Abstract: The United States at the dawn of the twentieth century was just beginning to comprehend the influence it could have on the international scene. It had no desire to become involved in the European power politics that had produced, in the lifetimes of many Americans then living, the Crimean War, the Franco-Prussian War and the essentially European Boer War in South Africa. Nevertheless, a distinct strain of expansionism could be found in American foreign policy. The belief was stirring in those concerned to establish a nonviolent world order that the interaction of nation-states would benefit from exposure to American values, American economic dynamism and the lessons to be drawn from the American federal experience. This belief, combined with a deep aversion to what was seen as essentially a European proclivity for settling disputes by resort to war, motivated some of the more influential participants in the American peace movement. That movement, in turn, gave birth to the American Society of International Law.

Conflict and the superpowers in the Horn of Africa

Abstract: The current conflict in the Horn of Africa is in many respects both regional and global. It is regional in the sense that its major driving forces are embedded in the nature of the states within this region, although this observation looks like an understatement in view of the fact that these states were themselves created by external forces. The conflict has acquired a global dimension, on the other hand, because of the level of the involvement of external actors, particularly the two superpowers. What are the implications of superpower involvement? At the regional level, this conflict directly concerns four countries, namely Kenya, Ethiopia, Djibouti, and Somalia. One major characteristic of these countries is their possession of a certain proportion of the Somali people, something which .most African historians regard as an accident of history. At this particular level of the conflict, the main issues contested are the ideals of self-determination and territorial integrity. The internationalisation of this conflict has, however, transformed it into a platform of East-West competition, involving the US and the Soviet Union with their allies. In the global context, the conflict touches on the economic, ideological, military and strategic interests of the superpowers. Both the US and the Soviet Union define what takes place in the Horn of Africawithin the perimeters of what they view as their national interests. They have often expressed concern for what they term the 'security' of this region but have not clearly defined what constitutes security for this region. Their notions of security, which to the West imply an absence of communism and to the East liberation from capitalism, do not seem to take into consideration the concrete local situation and the real needs of the peoples of this region. Indeed, most western analysts view security in terms of armaments and force levels, associating any challenge to the status quo with 'Soviet expansionism'. They, however, ignore the significance of internal struggles and the nature of production and distribution of wealth in most Third World countries. Yet it is clear that the 1978-9 Iranian revolution had nothing to do with communism and took place in a country that had the best weapons in the Persian Gulf. Even a little earlier, the 1974 Ethiopian revolution had no connection with Moscow. It was a product of the Ethiopian social formation and the Soviet Union moved in only in 1976, two years after the overthrow of Emperor Haile Selassie. The lesson these two cases offer is that a serious analysis of security in any region has to take cognisance of internal struggles. Given the internal and external ramifications of the conflict in the Horn, one is tempted to ask: Can the local states resolve their differences without the